As they rode she felt more and more at ease: it was fun knocking at weeds and grass with the pedals: all of a sudden France became USA, became Wisconsin, not foreignness, not isolation. The rooster on a fence, the dog barking at someone’s gate, crows flying: weren’t they home? "This way, darling. Our path ends at a farm." "Coming." The sun was out now. Someone’s windmill squawked rustily as their route narrowed and ended at a barbed wire fence: the windmill vanished behind trees, behind time. Orville got off his bike alongside a stile and laid the bike on the road; Jeannette leaned her handlebars against the wire of the fence. Beyond them, a field of grass stretched to another fence line, a smooth, green field, anchored in space by a red mowing machine deserted for the season. "I used to mow hay in this field," he said. "By hand?" "Sure thing." She climbed onto the stile and sat beside him, the weathered planks shaky, beetles crawling about under the bottom step ... Chuck had collected beetles as a kid ... Chuck would like it here, sitting in the sun. "Now ... now where?" she made herself ask. "Across the field," he said. "Your aunt said it may rain." "We can’t let a little thing like rain stop us." "I’m game." "Give me your hand." "What about our bikes?" "Nobody will bother them." "Wait ... not so fast. My skirt’s tight." "Jump." A field of grass: after the tank corps any field was inviting. In Ithaca, fields had extended toward the lake, downslope, fields between residences and groves: _High above Cayuga’s waters_ ... the Cornell song twanged for an instant. He led the way. Jeannette thought him handsome in his floppy trousers, tight striped jacket. How far off the hospital and its wounded! Orville, she said to herself. "Orv, Orv!" she said, as they walked through grass. Rushing forward she grabbed him, spun him around, and kissed him. "You’d make a good tackle!" "On your team." He gestured: "Over here there’s a shed, if it hasn’t been torn down ... see, there it is. That’s it." The shed was three-sided: a cattle feeder and temporary shelter, made of discarded timber and mismatched shingles, something flung together years ago, just high enough to walk under. As Orville and Jean stepped inside swallows flew away. "It’s nice and dry," Orville said. "It would be swell if we could picnic here ... there’s a little spring nearby ... I like it here." "I like it too." Someone had left a horse blanket rumpled on the bench; straw and hay littered the floor, the place smelled of timothy and clover and cattle. "You can stand there if you want to," she said. "I’m sitting down ... taking off my clothes." She was laughing at his expression, laughing with anticipation. "I’ll get my clothes off before you get yours off. Do you want us to be sedate?"